At an angle in one of the towers, now called St. Michael's
Chair, in which one person only could sit at a time, and that not
without danger, as the chair projected over a precipice, was a stone
lantern in which the monks formerly kept a light to guide seamen. The
legend connected with this was that if a married woman sits in the chair
before her husband has done so, she will rule over him, but if he sits
down on it first, he will be the master. We thought this legend must
have resulted from the visit of St. Keyne, as it corresponded with that
attached to her well near Liskeard which we have already recorded.
Perkin Warbeck, about whom we had heard at Exeter, and who in 1497
appeared in England with 7,000 men to claim the English throne, occupied
the castle on St. Michael's Mount for a short time with his beautiful
wife, the "White Rose of Scotland," whom he left here for safety while
he went forward to London to claim the crown. He was said to be a Jew,
or, to be correct, the son of a Tournai Jew, which possibly might in
some way or other account for the Jewish settlement at Marazion. His
army, however, was defeated, and he was hanged at Tyburn, November 23rd,
1499, while his wife was afterwards removed to the Court of Henry VII,
where she received every consideration and was kindly treated.
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